Kolkata Korner

Met Mess
The Indian Meteorological Department offers this strange information: Monsoons "officially" retreat from West Bengal on October 16. Now, when does something as unpredictable as the weather follow an "official" timetable? And just to prove that it doesn’t, the skies opened up just a day after theMet office here proclaimed that the monsoon was over (officially), thus leaving the meteorologists fumbling for an explanation. Not only heavy rains, but storms and hailstorms have lashed Kolkata and its neighbouring areas for the past few days. Trees have been uprooted and, as what has become routine by now, roads in large parts of the city have been going under water. All this, of course, has caused deep embarrassment to theMet office. Scrambling to come up with some excuse, they’ve now laid the blame on "faulty radars" that couldn’t detect the formation of low pressure and depression that led to the showers. And, just to be on the safe side, they’ve ‘predicted’ "moderate to heavy rains may occur" in Gangetic West Bengal for the next four weeks. And, after that, the mercury would dip to herald the onset ofWinter. How smart! Do we need meteorologists to tell us that temperatures would fall in mid-November? If these are the sort of predictions that theMet office here is capable of coming up with,  I say there’s no need to waste taxpayers’ money in thisestablishment.

Kolkata Rising
This city will start rising; that is, growing vertically by leaps and bounds. In a policy shift that should have come about a long time ago, the Bengal government is set to announce a relaxation in the height of buildings in and around Kolkata. This was music to the ears of builders. But the relaxation would also benefitKolkattans. The logic is simple: if a builder is allowed to build more floors, the cost of floor space would go down proportionally since the cost of land and other fixed costs would be shared by more consumers. The move would also ease the pressure on land as it would be possible to accommodate more people, offices, shops and commercial establishments on a plot of land soon that what’s possible now. It is strange that the government took so long to review floor-height ceilings and the floor area ratio for new constructions. As a seniorminister pointed out, it’s better to have a hundred apartments in a 25-storey building on a 1000 sq metre plot of land than five apartment blocks housing 20 flats on five floors spread over 5000 sq metres. What, however, cannot be overlooked (but is sure to be) are the civic and other infrastructure as well as enhanced fire fighting systems that need to be put in place before these skyscrapers come up. Or else, we’ll have another huge mess. But then, that’s nothing new for us in Kolkata, is it?

Anglo Meet
After 44 long years, the annual meet of Anglo-Indians got off to a rocking start in this city on Friday with a musical presentation at La Martiniere for Boys by Don Saigal, Rubin Robeiro and Clive Hughes. The All India Anglo-Indian Association organizes annual meets for members of the dwindling but lively community all over the country every year. But all these years, Kolkata has never been a venue. Which is a shame, because this community has been an integral part of this city and has contributed so much to Kolkata’s growth all these years. Anglo-Indians have, without doubt, played a disproportionately major role in making Kolkata a cosmopolitan city. Would Christmas and New Year’s celebrations in Kolkata be the same without this community? Sadly, the number of Anglo-Indians have steadily declined over the years as more and more of them have migrated to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, USA and other greener pastures. In those glorious days of yore, the best schoolteachers, restaurant and hotel managers, secretaries and crooners were all Anglo-Indians. Many other professions, like that of locomotive drivers, had a large share of Anglo-Indians. Areas like Ripon Street and Wellesley in Kolkata were Anglo-Indian strongholds. Even today, the community continues to contribute more than its share to Kolkata’s culture, education and development. It is, thus, not only fitting that Kolkata hosts this annual meet of the community, but makes the hundreds of delegates from 45 towns and cities across the country who have congregated here fell welcome. And make them want to come back every year.

More Than Just A Hotel
That’s the Great Eastern Hotel. Or the Grand Great Eastern Hotel, as the late Lalit Suri of Bharat Hotels Ltd fame re-christened it after taking it over a year ago. His death a few weeks back had cast doubts over grand plans to renovate the hotel and restore it to its past glory. But news is out now that the hotel’s new managers overseeing the restoration plans have received instructions from the Suri clan to go ahead with the project with added gusto. Kolkata, nay, India, will wait with bated breath to witness the glorious revival of what was once the grandest hotel on this side of the Suez. The hotel was started by an English confectioner, David Wilson, in 1840, and named Auckland Hotel after the then Governor-General Lord Auckland. On September 10, 1865, the hotel became a company called the Great eastern Hotel Wine & General Purveying Company. It was one of the first European companies to induct anIndian—Peary Chand Mitter—on its board in 1867. W.C.Bonnerjee, the first Indian president of the Indian National Congress, held shares worth Rs 5000 in the company from 1890-96. The hotel was the first such in Asia to be electrified in 1883. It figured in Rudyard Kipling’sCity of Dreadful Nights. In 1915, it was re-named as Great Eastern Hotel and even since its inception, it has played host to royalty, presidents and prime ministers, eminent personas and even Ho Chi Minh (now, now, haven’t I always said Commies are hypocrites?) in 1948. It was the nucleus of high society events in erstwhile Calcutta. Till things started declining since the early 1960s (in conjunction with the downslide of Bengal) and its management was taken over by the state government in 1975. The final blow came when the hotel was nationalized in 1980. Let’s hope that’s the past and this hotel can regain its glory. Much like what Kolkata, and Bengal, is trying to do.

Kolkata Still Cares
And ample proof of this is being provided by some schools that celebrate a ‘Grandparent’s Day’. The idea, says La Martiniere for Boys' principal Sunirmal Chakraborty, is to help kids develop a bond with their grandparents. In today’s world, most parents are just too busy to bond with their own parents. As a result, grandpas and grandmas remain strangers to their grandchildren. Schools like La Martiniere, St. James and Lakshmipat Singhania Academy have taken up this novel and laudable project of helping kids build this traditional and mutually beneficial bond with their grandparents. On Grandparents’ Day, kids are asked to bring along their grandpas and grandmas who tell stories and witness cultural programmes by the students. The schools also encourage their students to make a surprise gift for the elders. The grandparents are also encouraged by the schools to take active interest in their grandchildren’s education. They also ensure that this is not just one-day-in-a-year affair and the bond grows steadily throughout the year. The results have been encouraging. Like the grandfather of a student of Lakshmipat Singhania turning up one Saturday dressed as a hermit to regale the class of his grandson with tales from the Panchatantra. Wouldn’t it be nice if all schools encourage this?

Nobel Claim
Communists, truly, are an incorrigible and exasperating lot. No matter what good deeds are done in the rest of the world, they claim to do it better. Thus, when the Nobel Peace Prize went to Bangladesh’sMuhammad Yunus for his novel micro-credit movement that has lifted lakhs out of poverty, West Bengal’s Minister for Self-Help Groups, Rekha Goswami, claimed that the CPI(M)-led Left Front government has done a better job than Yunus in extending micro-credit through more than 4.05 self-help groups in the state. Bengal’s model, she claimed, was far better than Yunus’ since it is supported by the government, unlike in Bangladesh. That’s why, she said, her party posted a landslide win in this year’s Assembly polls. What she didn’t say was that her party monitors these groups that are controlled and funded by the panchayats, an overwhelming majority of which are firmly in the hands of the CPI(M). These self-help groups form the backbone of the CPI(M)’s support base in the rural areas. Be that as it may, Goswami needs to be told that it is precisely because Yunus’ Grammen Bank doesn’t have government support that the venture is so laudable. Or else, it would have got mired in red-tape, bureaucracy and become prone to political interference. And that’s why Yunus and his Bank got the Nobel. But expecting Goswami to appreciate this would be like expecting the cow to jump over the moon. And, by the way, I sincerely hope Goswami doesn’t lay claim to next year’s Nobel.